This weekend I finished playing Metroid II for the Game Boy on my 3DS. The idea was that I complete this game before Metroid: Samus Returns (remake of this) comes out in September.

The original came out in 1991, when I started high scool at the age of 14. I didn’t play it back then, never had the Nintendo Game Boy. This metroid can feel weird at first, because the main sprite is a little too large compared to the tiny screen, but the game is all right. Here is my end screen:

What a game!

Had it not been for the save/reload console state at the emulator (my actual game time was around 10 hours), or the fact that Nintendo Power published maps in 1992, I wouldn’t have been able to finish it in a reasonable time. Although the game is largely linear, it doesn’t have an automap feature so you need to draw something on your own. It’s actually crucial as there are parts which largely resemble each other and easy to get bogged down in the backtrack hell. I also cheated at the final boss fight and read up on the easiest strategy plus watched a couple of videos on YouTube. With this arsenal I made it!

I can’t even fathom to imagine what it’d have been in 1991 to play this game as a 14 year old kid. Figuring this game out on your own would’ve been just too much trial and error.